Variability and Consistency in First and Second Language Processing: A Masked Morphological Priming Study on Prefixation and Suffixation

Abstract

Word forms such as walked or walker are decomposed into their morphological constituents (walk + –ed/–er) during language comprehension. Yet, the efficiency of morphological decomposition seems to vary for different languages and morphological types, as well as for first and second language speakers. The current study reports results from a visual masked priming experiment focusing on different types of derived word forms (specifically prefixed vs. suffixed) in first and second language speakers of German. We compared the present findings with results from previous studies on inflection and compounding and proposed an account of morphological decomposition that captures both the variability and the consistency of morphological decomposition for different morphological types and for first and second language speakers. Open Practices This article has been awarded an Open Materials badge. Study materials are publicly accessible via the Open Science Framework at https://osf.io/vja85. Learn more about the Open Practices badges from the Center for Open Science: https://osf.io/tvyxz/wiki.

Morphological decomposition in Bantu: a masked priming study on Setswana prefixation

“…By contrast, derivational and compound priming seem to be more robust and stable across different groups of speakers (L1 and L2) and types of items; see e.g. González Alonso, Baquero Castellanos, and Müller (2016) (2017), Silva and Clahsen (2008) and Ciaccio and Clahsen (2019) for derivation. Taken together, these findings suggest that inflectional priming is less robust across different speaker groups and item types than priming with derived and compound words.…”

The Lexical Basis of Second Language Reading Comprehension: From (Sub)Lexical Knowledge to Processing Efficiency

“…To date, very little research has aimed to test whether sublexical processing efficiency, particularly morphological processing efficiency, would be a dimension of lexical competence that may uniquely predict L2 reading comprehension along with other dimensions (lexical vs. sublexical/morphological knowledge, on the one hand, and lexical processing efficiency, on the other hand). Overall, despite increasing interest in morphological knowledge and L2 reading comprehension (e.g., Ke et al., 2021; Kieffer & Lesaux, 2008; Zhang & Koda, 2012) and L2 morphological processing and lexical representation (Clahsen, Felser, Neubauer, Sato, & Silva, 2010; see also Ciaccio & Clahsen, 2020), little effort has been expended to combine the two lines of research and to examine how morphological processing efficiency may have a unique role to play during text reading. Logic suggests that if morphological knowledge is important for lexical inferencing and/or word decoding fluency during text comprehension, as some L2 studies have suggested (e.g., Zhang & Koda, 2012), the use of or access to this knowledge must occur in a rapid manner for comprehension to be smooth and efficient.…”

Lesen in der Fremdsprache Französisch. Kompetenzen von Drittklässlerinnen und Drittklässlern mit unterschiedlichen Schrift- und Sprachfähigkeiten in der Erstsprache Deutsch

“…Zudem legen diese Studien den Fokus tendenziell eher auf die Rechtschreibung (Kargl et al, 2014;Kargl et al, 2018). Seit 2015 wurden wichtige Priming-Studien zum Lesen durchgeführt (Bosch & Clahsen, 2016;Ciaccio & Clahsen, 2019;Hasenäcker et al, 2015;. Erfreulicherweise weisen neuere, gängige Lehrbücher zum Schriftspracherwerb und zu Lese-Rechtschreibstörungen auf die Bedeutung der morphologischen Bewusstheit im frühen Schriftspracherwerb der Schriftsprache Deutsch hin (Klicpera et al, 2017;Scheerer-Neumann, 2018).…”